Livestreaming Technology and Online Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse: A Scoping Review.

Livestreaming of child sexual abuse (LSCSA) is an established form of online child sexual exploitation and abuse (OCSEA). However, only a limited body of research has examined this issue. The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated internet use and user knowledge of livestreaming services emphasizing the importance of understanding this crime. In this scoping review, existing literature was brought together through an iterative search of eight databases containing peer-reviewed journal articles, as well as grey literature. Records were eligible for inclusion if the primary focus was on livestream technology and OCSEA, the child being defined as eighteen years or younger. Fourteen of the 2,218 records were selected. The data were charted and divided into four categories: victims, offenders, legislation, and technology. Limited research, differences in terminology, study design, and population inclusion criteria present a challenge to drawing general conclusions on the current state of LSCSA. The records show that victims are predominantly female. The average livestream offender was found to be older than the average online child sexual abuse offender. Therefore, it is unclear whether the findings are representative of the global population of livestream offenders. Furthermore, there appears to be a gap in what the records show on platforms and payment services used and current digital trends. The lack of a legal definition and privacy considerations pose a challenge to investigation, detection, and prosecution. The available data allow some insights into a potentially much larger issue.

Enhancing investigative interview training using a child avatar system: a comparative study of interactive environments.

The impact of investigative interviews by police and Child Protective Services (CPS) on abused children can be profound, making effective training vital. Quality in these interviews often falls short and current training programs are insufficient in enabling adherence to best practice. We present a system for simulating an interactive environment with alleged abuse victims using a child avatar. The purpose of the system is to improve the quality of investigative interviewing by providing a realistic and engaging training experience for police and CPS personnel. We conducted a user study to assess the efficacy of four interactive platforms: VR, 2D desktop, audio, and text chat. CPS workers and child welfare students rated the quality of experience (QoE), realism, responsiveness, immersion, and flow. We also evaluated perceived learning impact, engagement in learning, self-efficacy, and alignment with best practice guidelines. Our findings indicate VR as superior in four out of five quality aspects, with 66% participants favoring it for immersive, realistic training. Quality of questions posed is crucial to these interviews. Distinguishing between appropriate and inappropriate questions, we achieved 87% balanced accuracy in providing effective feedback using our question classification model. Furthermore, CPS professionals demonstrated superior interview quality compared to non-professionals, independent of the platform.

Enhancing questioning skills through child avatar chatbot training with feedback.

Training child investigative interviewing skills is a specialized task. Those being trained need opportunities to practice their skills in realistic settings and receive immediate feedback. A key step in ensuring the availability of such opportunities is to develop a dynamic, conversational avatar, using artificial intelligence (AI) technology that can provide implicit and explicit feedback to trainees. In the iterative process, use of a chatbot avatar to test the language and conversation model is crucial. The model is fine-tuned with interview data and realistic scenarios. This study used a pre-post training design to assess the learning effects on questioning skills across four child interview sessions that involved training with a child avatar chatbot fine-tuned with interview data and realistic scenarios. Thirty university students from the areas of child welfare, social work, and psychology were divided into two groups; one group received direct feedback (n = 12), whereas the other received no feedback (n = 18). An automatic coding function in the language model identified the question types. Information on question types was provided as feedback in the direct feedback group only. The scenario included a 6-year-old girl being interviewed about alleged physical abuse. After the first interview session (baseline), all participants watched a video lecture on memory, witness psychology, and questioning before they conducted two additional interview sessions and completed a post-experience survey. One week later, they conducted a fourth interview and completed another post-experience survey. All chatbot transcripts were coded for interview quality. The language model's automatic feedback function was found to be highly reliable in classifying question types, reflecting the substantial agreement among the raters [Cohen's kappa (κ) = 0.80] in coding open-ended, cued recall, and closed questions. Participants who received direct feedback showed a significantly higher improvement in open-ended questioning than those in the non-feedback group, with a significant increase in the number of open-ended questions used between the baseline and each of the other three chat sessions. This study demonstrates that child avatar chatbot training improves interview quality with regard to recommended questioning, especially when combined with direct feedback on questioning.

A field assessment of child abuse investigators' engagement with a child-avatar to develop interviewing skills.

BACKGROUND: Child investigative interviewing is a complex skill requiring specialised training. A critical training element is practice. Simulations with digital avatars are cost-effective options for delivering training. This study of real-world data provides novel insights evaluating a large number of trainees' engagement with LiveSimulation (LiveSim), an online child-avatar that involves a trainee selecting a question (i.e., an option-tree) and the avatar responding with the level of detail appropriate for the question type. While LiveSim has been shown to facilitate learning of open-ended questions, its utility (from a user engagement perspective) remains to be examined. OBJECTIVE: We evaluated trainees' engagement with LiveSim, focusing on patterns of interaction (e.g., amount), appropriateness of the prompt structure, and the programme's technical compatibility. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: Professionals (N = 606, mainly child protection workers and police) being offered the avatar as part of an intensive course on how to interview a child conducted between 2009 and 2018. METHODS: For descriptive analysis, Visual Basic for Applications coding in Excel was applied to evaluate engagement and internal attributes of LiveSim. A compatibility study of the programme was run testing different hardware focusing on access and function. RESULTS: The trainees demonstrated good engagement with the programme across a variety of measures, including number and timing of activity completions. Overall, knowing the utility of avatars, our results provide strong support for the notion that a technically simple avatar like LiveSim awake user engagement. This is important knowledge in further development of learning simulations using next-generation technology.

An overview of mock interviews as a training tool for interviewers of children.

Mock (simulated) interviews can be used as a safe context for trainee interviewers to learn and practice questioning skills. When mock interviews are designed to reflect the body of scientific evidence on how questioning skills are best learned, research has demonstrated that interviewers acquire relevant and enduring skills. Despite the importance of this exercise in learning interview skill and its prevalence as a learning tool in other fields such as medicine and allied health, there has been relatively little discussion about mock interviews from an educational perspective in investigative interview training. This paper addresses that gap by providing the first comprehensive overview of the way mock interviews have been used in training interviewers of children. We describe the research that supports their utility, and the various ways they can be implemented in training: providing insight to learners; allowing opportunities for practice, feedback, and discussion; and as a standardized way to assess skill change over time. The paper also includes an overview of the cutting-edge use of avatars in mock interviews to enhance efficiency, provide unique learning experiences, and ultimately reduce training costs. We explain why avatars may be particularly useful in basic training, freeing up human trainers to facilitate mock interviews around advanced topics and discussion.

Maltreatment and trauma symptoms: Does type of maltreatment matter?

OBJECTIVE: Children frequently report a heightened experience of psychological problems such as depression, anxiety, aggression, and posttraumatic stress disorder in response to maltreatment. However, in recent years, scholars have suggested that different types of maltreatment may be associated with different symptomatology in children. METHOD: In the present study, we employ the Trauma Symptom Checklist for Young Children (TSCYC) to investigate whether children who have experienced different types of maltreatment reveal different profiles of symptomatology. Nonmaltreated (n = 101) and maltreated (n = 52) children between 3 and 12 years of age were included in the present study. Maltreatment was further categorized into the subgroups abuse and neglect. RESULTS: Findings proved the TSCYC to be successful in distinguishing nonmaltreated from maltreated children in terms of symptomatology. Furthermore, abused children showed a broader spectrum of symptoms, whereas neglected children differed on fewer symptom scales compared with their nonmaltreated peers. Lastly, abused children evinced more externalizing symptoms than the neglected children. CONCLUSION: In line with previous research, maltreated children do have more psychological symptoms, and, abused children showed enhanced psychological problems and more externalizing symptoms in particular. (PsycINFO Database Record

Maltreated and non-maltreated children's true and false memories of neutral and emotional word lists in the Deese/Roediger-McDermott task.

Maltreated (n=26) and non-maltreated (n=31) 7- to 12-year-old children were tested on the Deese/Roediger-McDermott (DRM) false memory task using emotional and neutral word lists. True recall was significantly better for non-maltreated than maltreated children regardless of list valence. The proportion of false recall for neutral lists was comparable regardless of maltreatment status. However, maltreated children showed a significantly higher false recall rate for the emotional lists than non-maltreated children. Together, these results provide new evidence that maltreated children could be more prone to false memory illusions for negatively valenced information than their non-maltreated counterparts.

High accuracy but low consistency in children's long-term recall of a real-life stressful event.

The accuracy and consistency of children's memories of their removals from their biological families by the Child Protective Services (CPS) was investigated. A researcher was present during the removals and documented what happened. A total of 37 maltreated children, aged 3 to 12 years, were interviewed 1 week and 3 months after the removals. The accuracy of the memory reports was high at both time points, but their consistency was fairly low; in all age groups (3-6, 7-10, and 11-12 years), a high percentage of new accurate information was reported during the second interview and a high percentage of the accurate information reported in the first interview was omitted in the second interview. Older children were significantly more consistent in their memory reports than younger children. The results show that low consistency in memory does not imply memory inaccuracy and has implications for the interpretation of successive interviews of children in forensic contexts.

Children's memories of removal: a test of attachment theory.

We report a study of parents' attachment orientations and children's autobiographical memory for an experience that according to Bowlby's (1982) attachment theory should be particularly threatening-children's forced separation from their parents. It was hypothesized that individual differences in parents' attachment orientations would be associated with children's distress and memory for this highly traumatic event. Children (n = 28) were observed during forced removal from home or school by Child Protective Services due to allegations of child maltreatment. Children's memory for the removal was tested 1 week later, and biological parents (n = 28) completed an adult attachment measure. Parental attachment anxiety significantly predicted children's distress during less stressful phases of the removal, R(2) = .25, and parents' attachment-related avoidance predicted fewer correct memory reports from the children (i.e., fewer hits to open-ended questions, R(2) = .16, and fewer hits to direct questions, R(2) = .27). The findings indicate that attachment theory provides important guidance for understanding children's autobiographical memory for traumatic events.